On Thursday, September 26, a meeting of the Standing Committee of the Asian Parliamentary Assembly on Social and Cultural Affairs was held in Moscow in the House of the Unions. The agenda included the issues of preserving national identity, historical memory, and cultural heritage.
The meeting brought together 18 delegations — Russia's leading partners in the Asian region, including delegations from Azerbaijan, Qatar, Iraq, Türkiye, and China.
Boris Chernyshov
Boris Alexandrovich
read the words of greetings to the participants of the meeting from the Chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav
Volodin
Vyacheslav Victorovich
The Chairman of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation of the eighth convocation. Elected in single mandate constituency № 163 (Saratov constituency - Saratov Oblast)
.
“The Assembly contributes to building a just world order and a multipolar world, contributes to strengthening of inter-parliamentary cooperation, and facilitates the exchange of lawmaking experience and opinions on issues of the regional and global agenda,” says the text of the greeting from the Chairman of the State Duma.
Russia is a platform for dialogue
The Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Boris Chernyshov emphasized that Russia “is glad to provide a platform for dialogue while holding such meetings”. “New challenges and threats in the conditions of the formation of a multipolar world require the unification and consolidation of countries interested in progressive development. Many states that are the APA member states act as core elements of multilateral platforms that set the trends for the development of international cooperation: BRICS, SCO, ASEAN,” he said.
According to him, the State Duma is taking measures aimed at countering the undermining of values and protecting national sovereignty. “Especially destructive work can be seen in the activity of foreign agents and hostile NGOs from the countries of the global West. We are also ready to share such kind of experience, our developments in this area,” added the Deputy Chairman of the State Duma.
Formation of a just world order
New challenges and threats in the conditions of the formation of a multipolar world require the unification and consolidation of countries interested in progressive development, according to Boris Chernyshov. Such cooperation, according to him, should be out of confrontational ideological or political ideas, and should be built on the principles of mutual respect and equality. “I hope that the decisions we make will help to strengthen the ties between our countries,” added the parliamentarian.
The meeting participants supported Russia’s draft resolution of parliamentarians of Asian countries on the formation of a more just multipolar world order reflecting cultural and civilizational diversity.
In the document, the members of the Assembly note with deep concern the increasing number of cases of discrimination, intolerance, terrorism and extremism motivated by racial, national or religious hatred, prejudice against persons of different ethnic origin or other religions.
In this regard, they call for enhancing interstate and public cooperation within the framework of the APA to strengthen its role in the development of a multipolar world order. According to the draft, the participants of the Asian Parliamentary Assembly intend to strengthen inter-parliamentary cooperation in such areas as culture, social issues, protection of cultural heritage and preserving the cultural identity of the countries.
They also undertake to promote the formation of a sustainable architecture of equal and indivisible security in the Eurasian region for jointly countering common challenges and threats, resolving and preventing conflicts in the interests of maintaining sustainable peace and stability on the continent, advocate for the inviolability and strict observance of the rights of all confessions, a guarantee of peaceful coexistence of religions.
It is also proposed to strongly condemn the increasing wars, conflicts in the world and their negative impact on the destruction of cultural and civilizational values. In addition, the APA member states condemn the glorification of the Nazi movement, neo-Nazism and militarism in any form and call for countering that.
The Asian Parliamentary Assembly (APA) was established in 2006 at the seventh session of the Association of Asian Parliaments for Peace (AAPP), which was held in Tehran. AAPP was established on the initiative of Bangladesh in 1999, Russia was one of the countries founding AAPP.
Now the APA consists of the parliaments
of 44 states, including India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Malaysia,
Bangladesh, the United Arab Emirates, Pakistan, the Republic of Korea, Russia, Saudi
Arabia, Türkiye, and Uzbekistan. 14 states and 10 international organizations have
observer status.
